


Universal Language

by Ladybug_21



Series: Growing Pains [3]
Category: Broadchurch
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, Kid Fic, Lullabies, Working Mums
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:40:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25481794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladybug_21/pseuds/Ladybug_21
Summary: Motherhood brings out some of Jocelyn's hidden talents.
Relationships: Jocelyn Knight/Maggie Radcliffe
Series: Growing Pains [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1836136
Comments: 8
Kudos: 51





	Universal Language

**Author's Note:**

> A semi-response to some readers' requests for a story about Jocelyn taking care of her kid on her own—hopefully not too serious in tone for what alba89 or Izzy were expecting, at any rate. I own no rights to _Broadchurch_.

As inconvenient as Jocelyn's occasional weeks in London were, the trade-off was that she worked from home the rest of the month. The extrovert in Maggie always felt that not being able to go to a physical workspace would be some form of psychological punishment, but Jocelyn's introverted self certainly didn't seem to mind. Because she was out and about anyway, Maggie had been tasked with most of the dropping-off and picking-up necessary now that Jules had started primary school, even if she sometimes needed to head back to the newsroom after she deposited him back at home with Jocelyn. Most days, Maggie was perfectly fine with this arrangement, especially since if things were getting too hectic around _The Echo_ , she knew that she could usually count on Jocelyn to pull herself away from her desk and pick Jules up herself.

And the benefit to Jocelyn's primary workplace being her home office was, of course, that she could stay home with Jules whenever he was too ill to go to school.

"You're _sure_ you'll be all right?" Maggie asked, turning back halfway out the door. "Given that court meeting you have today, and all..."

"You'll be late," Jocelyn scolded, kissing Maggie again even as she nudged her out of the house. "And we'll be fine."

"I know, but..."

" _Go_ , Maggie," Jocelyn insisted, exasperated. "I'll call if anything comes up."

Jocelyn would be the first to admit that Maggie was an infinitely more natural parent than she was. Jules was the perfect excuse for Maggie to unleash the inner child that had always lurked just below the surface. The two played football on the beach together, laughed themselves silly over Jules's favourite animated films together, pulled faces at each other over dinner while Jocelyn pretended not to notice. If Jules turned the stereo on in the living room and began dancing, Maggie would instantly join him; but whenever she tried to drag Jocelyn into their antics, Jocelyn would always protest, grinning with embarrassment, most comfortable watching her family's merriment from the sidelines. Everyone agreed that, objectively, Jules looked much more like Jocelyn; but he and Maggie were such close co-conspirators that Maggie's sunny _joie de vivre_ shone through Jules's demeanour, drowning out any of the solemnity with which onlookers might have easily linked him to Jocelyn. Most days, Jocelyn couldn't help but feel that Jules was somehow more Maggie's son than hers.

Still, just because Maggie's personality was inherently much more aligned with Jules's did _not_ mean that Jocelyn didn't know how to take care of her son when he was sick. If she somehow had been able to maintain some semblance of control over Jules's seventh birthday party last month—outnumbered by a dozen shouting, cake-fuelled children for the better part of an hour, while Maggie ran out to buy more fruit juice and paper plates—then Jocelyn could certainly keep an eye on her own bedridden child without catastrophe arising.

She gently knocked on Jules's bedroom door and pushed it open. The little boy had clearly been dozing, but he started awake when Jocelyn entered.

"Mummy's just left for work," Jocelyn told him. She set a glass of water down on the night stand and sat down on the edge of his bed. "How are you feeling?"

"Sleepy," sighed Jules, seeming to sink an inch or so back into his pillow. He stretched one arm above his head in a catlike manner that reminded Jocelyn very much of Maggie being woken up against her will in the morning.

Jocelyn put a hand on his forehead. He still felt very warm. She'd have to take his temperature more formally, later.

"I need to call into a conference in about twenty minutes," she told Jules. "Can I get you anything, before then?"

Jules shook his head slightly, his eyes already closed, but he brought the hand that was above his blankets back down from over his head to rest against Jocelyn's wrist. Jocelyn sighed softly.

"I'll sit here with you until I have to go, just in case you change your mind," she told Jules, who was already half-asleep but smiled, regardless.

And she did, watching as her son slipped back into slumber proper, his breathing slowing to a rhythm that was more even, if slightly more jagged than usual. Jocelyn, humming slightly, gently rubbed her thumb against Jules's wrist, quietly marvelling at the extraordinary little human being she had the privilege to raise. When she realised that she only had a few minutes before her conference started, she tucked Jules's arm back under his blankets, kissed him on the forehead, and quietly shut the door behind her as she left the room.

As horrifying as the coronavirus pandemic had been, Jocelyn was grateful that it had rendered the English-and-Welsh court system infinitely more amenable to remote appearances, especially for out-of-court conferences on preliminary matters. Jocelyn and her counterpart's junior were both calling into the judge's chambers by video; the judge was physically in the room only with the other QC and Ben.

 _Just to warn you, I'm at home with an ailing child today, so if I have to abandon you at any point, I apologise in advance_ , Jocelyn texted Ben.

 _Oof, have been there_ , Ben texted back. _Thanks for the heads up, and good luck!_

And it ended up being a good thing that Jocelyn had warned Ben, for half an hour into the meeting, she heard Jules calling from his bedroom. Unsure whether she should unmute her microphone and ask for a brief recess, given the background noise, Jocelyn instead texted Ben again, who asked on her behalf. The instant the judge had formally called the recess, Jocelyn turned her camera off and rushed down the hallway.

"Jules, is everything all right?" she asked as she pushed open the door.

Jules had clearly been thrashing about in bed, and when Jocelyn put a hand on his arm, his eyes flew open.

"Mum!" he sobbed, and Jocelyn gathered him in her arms. "I dreamt that you and Mummy were walking on the cliff by the sea, and the cliff disappeared and you fell."

"I'm right here," Jocelyn promised him, rocking his shaking frame back and forth. "Everything's fine. It was only a dream."

"Please don't leave," Jules begged.

And in that moment, Jocelyn wanted to do nothing more than hold her boy for the rest of the afternoon, scare away all of his fever nightmares, make sure he felt as secure and loved as possible. But there was still the conference. With a sigh, Jocelyn texted Ben and asked him to ask the judge if she could have five more minutes. Then she moved Jules to her bedroom, tucked him into Maggie's side of the bed, and dragged her office chair into the bedroom so that she could set up her laptop on one side of her night stand. (The blank wall behind her was a less elegant backdrop than the bookshelves in her office, but that couldn't be helped.)

"My Lady," said Jocelyn when the conference resumed, "I hope the court won't consider it a breach of confidentiality between the parties that I'm currently in the same room as my feverish seven year old. I assure you that he wouldn't understand much, even if he were awake."

"Well, I certainly don't have any objections," chuckled the judge, and neither did the opposing counsel (the recent pandemic also had made virtually everyone in the legal community more sympathetic to the phenomenon of working from home with children present).

And, fortunately, Jules slept dreamlessly through the rest of the call. It comforted Jocelyn more than she had realised it would, to be able to glance up every few minutes and make sure that her boy was still breathing and looked as well as possible given the circumstances. She called Ben immediately after the conference ended to discuss a few of the matters that had arisen, and once the two barristers had agreed on a plan of action moving forward, Jocelyn added, "Ben, thank you, for your help earlier."

"Like I said, I've definitely been in your shoes before," Ben laughed. "How's he doing?"

"Just fine, right now." On impulse, Jocelyn looked up again to check on her son. "Nothing that won't be gone in a few days. But thank you for asking."

"Of course," said Ben graciously. "You stay well, too, Jocelyn, and we'll talk soon."

Jules was stirring by the time Jocelyn had ended her call with Ben.

"I hope I didn't keep you awake with all of that talking?" Jocelyn asked him as she hung up her blazer in the closet on the other side of the room.

"No," yawned Jules. "And whenever I did wake up, it meant that I knew where you were."

Jocelyn smiled and asked if Jules would mind if she left for a few minutes to go make some lunch. He was dozing again by the time Jocelyn returned with two bowls of chicken noodle soup on two stacked trays. She took Jules's temperature (still a little high, but nothing too alarming) and then talked him into eating some food, even though he complained that he wasn't hungry and picked sullenly at the noodles after he'd drunk most of the broth.

"Will you tell me a story?" Jules asked drowsily, once Jocelyn had given up on trying to make him eat the rest of his lunch and had slid his tray onto Maggie's night stand.

Jocelyn, sitting back against the pillows on her own side of the bed, smiled. When Jules was small, he had always wanted one of his mums to tell him a story while he fell asleep. Jocelyn, of course, initially had gone to the library and brought home every book of children's stories and folktales that she could find. Maggie, by contrast, had simply begun creating wild fables out of thin air, and since Jules found the interaction infinitely more engaging than looking at a page, Jocelyn had eventually forced herself to put all of the books aside and lean into the uncertainty of narrative improvisation. She and Maggie had had a good laugh over the fact that their storytelling styles were almost perfect parodies of their professional choices. Maggie's bedtime stories lacked any subtlety, each new plot point declared in bold print as if torn from the headline of a newspaper, no real logic necessarily connecting each new occurrence to the last, any suspense created purely because of the excitement with which Maggie related the facts at hand. Jocelyn, by contrast, thought out meticulously plotted tales in advance, built up her narratives detail by detail, and always waited until the very end to let the last piece slide into place so that the rest of the story all fit together.

Maggie eventually told Jocelyn that she had to stop being such a barrister when putting their son to bed, because Jules always wanted to find out the twist at the end of Jocelyn's stories, and that only made him force himself to stay awake even longer. And so Jocelyn had trained herself to stick to simple, predictable narratives whose endings were less the point than the process of telling the story itself. But Jules was older now, and surely he'd want some logical substance to the story he was being told? Besides, Jocelyn was horribly out of practice at this sort of thing and didn't want to fall short of expectations.

"I don't want you to have any more nightmares," Jocelyn said, which was a truthful excuse. "And I know you don't want to listen to a story that doesn't have an antagonist of some sort."

"A what?" yawned Jules.

"A villain," Jocelyn clarified, even though a lifetime of practising law had taught her that not all antagonists were necessarily villainous.

"Oh, yeah," Jules conceded. "Well, what about the song that you were singing earlier?"

It took Jocelyn a moment to remember that she had even been humming, in the first place. And this seemed like a reasonable enough request, given that Jocelyn had brought it upon herself. The barrister scooted over so she could stroke her son's hair while she quietly sang in her low voice.

_Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling_  
_From glen to glen, and down the mountain side._  
_The summer's gone, and all the roses falling,_  
_It's you, it's you must go and I must bide..._

Jocelyn thought she had imagined hearing the door open downstairs, but by the time she had finished singing the chorus of the second verse, Maggie was standing just outside the bedroom door, watching her family with a small smile. Jules had drifted back off to sleep, so when Jocelyn noticed Maggie, she put a finger to her lips, then slipped off the bed and quietly collected the soup bowls and spoons and trays.

"I hope you don't mind that I put him on your side of the bed," Jocelyn whispered. "He was having bad dreams earlier."

Maggie closed the door behind Jocelyn and leaned in for a kiss.

"Of course not," she said. "Had a break in my afternoon and thought I'd come by to see how you two were doing."

"Just fine, as you can see," Jocelyn reassured her as she made her way back downstairs with the dirty dishes, Maggie following. "How's your morning been?"

"Busy, but good." Maggie leaned against the doorframe of the kitchen, her arms crossed, as Jocelyn began rinsing out the soup bowls. "You were singing."

"I was," said Jocelyn, attention still on the sink.

"I don't think I've ever heard you sing before," Maggie told her, an edge of hurt in her tone.

Jocelyn turned off the tap, suddenly feeling guilty. Because Maggie, of course, was the type to turn on the radio full blast and happily belt along to whatever was on, often messing up the lyrics and always slightly under-pitch. And, just as with the occasional dancing in the living room, Jocelyn never joined in. During the first dance at their wedding—when Jocelyn had been obligated to join in at least the dancing—Maggie had sung along joyfully to 'In My Life', beaming at Jocelyn as radiantly as a star and singing as if the Beatles had written the song just for this occasion. (Beth Latimer had somehow convinced Maggie to let Nige Carter DJ the wedding, and Nige Carter had done a surprisingly wonderful job with the music, to everyone's delight.) Jocelyn, by contrast, had simply smiled and smiled as she pressed her cheek to Maggie's; she was horribly self-conscious of the fact that all of their wedding guests were watching them (as was the point) and ended up closing her eyes so that she could pretend that she and Maggie were the only two people in the world at that moment (which, in some sense, was also the point). She had been far too shy to sing then, with everyone watching, and even though she knew that Maggie didn't love her any less for not singing along, Jocelyn still knew how much it would have meant to Maggie if she had.

"I don't sing often," she admitted. "In fact, I don't think I've even sung to Jules since he was much younger."

"But you used to?"

"When he was a baby, yes," Jocelyn shrugged.

"I didn't know that." Maggie continued to look somewhat stung. "Did you only do it when I wasn't around?"

"Not consciously," said Jocelyn after a flustered moment. "It was just usually in the middle of the day, when you were down at the newsroom. I wasn't _trying_ to hide it from you."

"And yet." Maggie pursed her lips pensively. "Jocelyn, I know you're the type not to do something publicly unless you know you can do it flawlessly. I've known that for years, and I've always accepted it about you, and after all this time, I certainly don't expect you to change anytime soon. But did it ever occur to you that I wouldn't judge you in the _slightest_ for singing, even if you failed to sound just like Maria bloody Callas?"

"I know." Jocelyn bit her lip. "But with Jules, I started singing to him before he was old enough to even know _how_ to judge. It's always just been easy. I can sing 'Danny Boy' to him, and he doesn't realise that I've just had to drop down the octave for the chorus..."

"You mean, like everyone else does with that song," Maggie interjected. "Again, stop holding yourself to an unrealistic standard. You're a _barrister_ , no one even expects you to have any musical talent in the first place."

"I was forced to take two miserable years of piano lessons, in my youth," Jocelyn grumbled. "From a terrifying woman who lived about a five-minute walk away from here, in fact."

"Well." Maggie scowled, still less than satisfied.

"Maggie," Jocelyn sighed, "you know that I'm not all that forthcoming with expressing emotions. I don't always know the right words to say, to show that I care. I know that _you_ know how to interpret exactly what I say and do, but I also know that you're the rare exception to the rule. Someone once said that music was a universal language, and... I don't know, I suppose I just felt that, when Jules was very small, singing him lullabies was a sure way that I could make him understand just how much I loved him. And you've never needed me to resort to singing to explain that to you."

Maggie's expression had softened over the course of this explanation. Finally, she uncrossed her arms and took a step or two forward so she could wrap her arms around Jocelyn.

"I've never _needed_ you to resort to singing to explain that to me, no," she agreed. "But I certainly wouldn't _mind_ if you did, especially now that I know what a nice singing voice you have." She smiled and kissed Jocelyn. "I have to get back to _The Echo_. But I'm glad that you apparently survived the conference call well enough. And let me know if I need to come back before this evening."

Jocelyn spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on her bed, typing a brief on her laptop with her son breathing steadily a few feet away. When Maggie returned home for the evening, they managed to convince a groggy Jules to eat some more soup for dinner before he curled back up on Maggie's half of the bed and refused to be moved. Maggie, rolling her eyes a bit, gently pushed the little invalid closer to the centre of the bed so that all three of them could fit. And, as Jules was already half-asleep where he had cuddled against Maggie, he didn't notice how his mothers gazed at each other as Jocelyn quietly sang:

_Are you going to Scarborough Fair?_  
_Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme_  
_Remember me to one who lives there_  
_She once was a true love of mine._


End file.
